Shuanghui International has hired six banks to lead a Hong Kong listing next year to help pay down the $7bn debt that it took on to buy fellow pork manufacturer Smithfield Foods of the US and to provide its private equity backers with an exit.
The share sale, pencilled in for the first half of next year, could raise up to $6bn with up to half the company being sold, according to people with knowledge of the process, making it one of the largest deals seen in Hong Kong since AIA’s $20bn share sale in 2010.
Shuanghui International is backed by CDH, one of the China’s longest established private equity funds, which owns about one-third of the company.